Remember when Friendster was a burgeoning fad? Bringing thousands of people together easily within months, this website started the hugely popular trend amongst the mostly teenage generation of online social networking. What did we end up afterwards with but several copycat sites, parody sites, and even sites that ended up being more successful.
Friendster, in the beginning, seemed like harmless fun. Something we were able to personalize and connect with our old friends, but as Demetri Martin said, then it became a little lame. What as it about the site that killed it? Perhaps it was the advent of the vacuous might of MySpace. Well, no doubt we can all blame MySpace for both good things and bad, social networking has really changed the face of the Internet in the last few years. Let us count the ways.
What started with Friendster and evolved into Myspace maybe has its roots in the beginnings of Livejournal and it's lesser cousin, Xanga. Make your own page, write your own thoughts, and create your own online persona. But wait, now you can add your friends and even subscribe to their own thoughts. XML and RSS, two main tools for online syndication have lubricated the process so well that practically every website that matters carries a feed built for subscription. Even this blog itself has built-in XML for any random stranger to tack on their reader. How does this figure into the social networking scale?
Well...
MySpace actually started their own blog system a long while back, letting the emo-riddled masses type up their thoughts in purely AnArchIcAl typography is a no-brainer. How many have seem the goth equivalent to Livejournal, Deadjournal? How many have seen the even more vacant concoction that is Melodramatic?
Right...
So the propensity for heavy blogging and sharing how tortured one's thoughts are is only the beginning. Now, we even have the onset of Last.FM. We can call this social Radio networking if you will. The concept itself is brilliant, the site scrubs your own personal media player (iTunes, WMP, Rhapsody, et al) and syndicates it for all or none to see. "Oh look, so-and-so listens to Coldplay, but also listens to Britney Spears." is not an uncommon statement, but when does it become, "My playlist is cooler than yours?"
Perhaps this is the dark side of social networking. Those Friendster-whores and MySpace-gluttons with thousands of friends, how many of them really can say they know absolutely everyone on their list personally? How many people out there actually "know" and "love" Tom? What's worse is the obvious cyber-stalking factor of any social network. As a guy, I really have no fear of random strangers happening upon my terribly generic profiles, but any girl with a picture up on their profile can be subject to any creep out there with a T1. I won't even get into the most awful of crimes committed via these websites, but let it be said that policing networks has to be a difficult task enough to make any grown man cry.
While there are dark aspects to it, there are always benefits. Flickr itself is a great way to waste time reaming through millions of fascinating photographs. Last.FM itself looks like a great way to discover new music and share it all with your friends. Friendster and MySpace have both connected many I know with lost friends and acquaintances with whom they've lost touch. Although I've maligned aspects of the sites themselves in ways, there is no doubt they're successful for good reason.
What's been said before about all of these sites is published everywhere on the web. Paranoia and praise alike, no single site is protected from various scrutiny. Just think about it, how generic and protected are our profiles? How unsearchable and anonymous are we? I suppose it's a good thing to be ungoogleable, but do we really know it to be fact?
Spooky.
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2 comments:
Gotta agree with you there. The fact Friendster is trying to make themselves more like MySpace (blogs, adjustable profiles, inclusion of embedded music, and shout outs) is simple evidence of trying to save a sinking ship. A friend of mine once said looking at a MySpace page was like looking at the Internet circa 1997. It's almost enough to make the eyes bleed.
a belated comment, but i have to say that i actually preferred friendster for its simplicity. i think what killed it early on was the slowness. they grew too quickly and just weren't prepared. in more ways than allowing more 'freedom'. too late now, either way.
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